{"id":1818108,"date":"2023-08-24T14:18:31","date_gmt":"2023-08-24T18:18:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/?p=1818108"},"modified":"2023-08-24T14:18:31","modified_gmt":"2023-08-24T18:18:31","slug":"can-places-on-google-maps-be-trusted","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2023\/08\/can-places-on-google-maps-be-trusted\/","title":{"rendered":"Can Places on Google Maps Be Trusted?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Google has been plagued with fraudulent and scammy business listings on Google Maps for years (1<\/a>, 2<\/a>). Last April, Google posted about the steps it takes to combat fake content<\/a>. James Killick points to more recent incidents and wonders whether places on Google Maps can still be trusted<\/a>; given that he was able to add a fake listing and have it appear on the map within hours, signs point to no.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Google has been plagued with fraudulent and scammy business listings on Google Maps for years (1, 2). Last April, Google posted about the steps it takes to combat fake content. James Killick points to more… More<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"link","meta":{"autoblue_enabled":true,"autoblue_custom_message":"","autoblue_shares":[],"autoblue_post_url":"","_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[110,80],"tags":[197,822,82],"class_list":["post-1818108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-link","hentry","category-map-errors","category-mobile","tag-business-listings","tag-fraud","tag-google-maps","post_format-post-format-link"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":1813701,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2023\/04\/how-google-deals-with-fake-content-on-google-maps\/","url_meta":{"origin":1818108,"position":0},"title":"How Google Deals with Fake Content on Google Maps","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"3 April 2023","format":"link","excerpt":"In a blog post last Friday, Google offers some detail on how it combats fraudulent user-submitted content on Google Maps. These include fake business profiles, fake reviews, contributed photos with fake phone numbers\u2014it\u2019s basically about business listings. (There was a time, of course, when fake user-submitted content was to the\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mobile"","block_context":{"text":"Mobile","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/mobile\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":4280,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2017\/04\/how-many-fake-business-listings-are-there-on-google-maps\/","url_meta":{"origin":1818108,"position":1},"title":"How Many Fake Business Listings Are There on Google Maps?","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"18 April 2017","format":"link","excerpt":"Bogus business listings on Google Maps have been a thing for a while; a new research paper, authored by researchers at Google and the University of San Diego,\u00a0tries to quantify the scale and scope of the problem. The\u00a0New Scientist reports: To analyse the scope of this abuse, the group looked\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Crime"","block_context":{"text":"Crime","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/crime\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1787450,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2019\/06\/millions-of-business-listings-on-google-maps-are-fake-wsj\/","url_meta":{"origin":1818108,"position":2},"title":"Millions of Business Listings on Google Maps Are Fake: WSJ","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"20 June 2019","format":"link","excerpt":"The Wall Street Journal goes in-depth on a problem Google Maps has had for years: fake and deceptive business listings posted by scam artists that crowd out legitimate local businesses\u2014as many as 11 million such listings at any given moment, according to experts. Online advertising specialists identified by Google as\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Map Errors"","block_context":{"text":"Map Errors","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/map-errors\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":844729,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2017\/12\/googles-map-data-alchemy\/","url_meta":{"origin":1818108,"position":3},"title":"Google’s Map Data Alchemy","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"27 December 2017","format":"link","excerpt":"Justin O'Beirne's lengthy analyses of Google Maps and Apple Maps are always worth reading, and his latest is no exception. Looking at the rapid proliferation of buildings, areas of interest\u00a0and other examples of\u00a0Google's Ground Truthing program, Justin discovers that Google's buildings data are a product of its satellite imagery, its\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Industry"","block_context":{"text":"Industry","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/industry\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1837813,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2025\/03\/google-maps-has-a-lot-of-user-contributed-imagery-in-the-wrong-places\/","url_meta":{"origin":1818108,"position":4},"title":"Google Maps Has a Lot of User-Contributed Imagery in the Wrong Places","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"12 March 2025","format":"link","excerpt":"https:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=CMemCW8aDWs Geography Now was poking around northern Chad in Google Maps and came across a bunch of user-contributed 360-degree images of business interiors that had nothing to do with Chad: they were associated with businesses in Brazil, India, Hungary and so forth. I\u2019m inclined to think these were geocoding glitches\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Map Errors"","block_context":{"text":"Map Errors","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/map-errors\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/img.youtube.com\/vi\/CMemCW8aDWs\/0.jpg?resize=350%2C200","width":350,"height":200},"classes":[]},{"id":1790207,"url":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/2021\/02\/google-and-apple-updates\/","url_meta":{"origin":1818108,"position":5},"title":"Google and Apple Updates","author":"Jonathan Crowe","date":"23 February 2021","format":"link","excerpt":"Google explains how they identify and take action against fraudulent content\u2014fake reviews, fake listings, content vandalism\u2014on Google Maps. Meanwhile, the ability to pay for parking and transit fares is being integrated into the Google Maps app (Engadget, The Verge). On the Apple Maps front, cycling directions have come to Portland,\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Mobile"","block_context":{"text":"Mobile","link":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/category\/mobile\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1818108"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818108\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1818110,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1818108\/revisions\/1818110"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1818108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1818108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.maproomblog.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1818108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}